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I tried to use the technical terms and you didn't seem to understand with those. Abstract labels seemed to be a more appropriate tack.
Why aren't you satisfied with the EOB? It's a bunch of random number that has no association with what you actually pay, that seems to be to your liking.
You have not used the proper terminology. You've babbled about fruit.
EOBs are fine. They do, indeed, give relevant information. Why can't you even do that much?
What are you doing with the information in the EOB? How does it alter your decision making?
It's far too late at that point, because you've been lying and hiding the price from me at the time that it could have mattered. Probably the biggest way it alters my decision making is that seeing one reminds me to distrust people like you who are lying and hiding things from me, only to have it spring up later in a possible huge surprise.
It has no relevance to you, I can only tell you that so many times.
It has relevance to me. I'm telling you that it has relevance to me, and I can only tell you that so many times. (Vastly more so if I had access to the information at the appropriate time.) You cannot hear me, because you are lying to yourself and to me. You do not get to determine what has relevance to me. That is not your job. You are not god. You are not Stalin. You are not the sole arbiter of what information has relevance to others. Especially when you have an insane conflict of interest. (EDIT: Remember the snippet of the NYT op-ed; you can just be wrong sometimes about what has relevance to others. Fundamentally, you are not them; you do not know their situation or what is of interest/relevance/value to them, the same as how auto mechanics, no matter how artistic, no matter how well-educated, no matter how perfectly they know their craft compared to their customers, do not know the situation of or what is of interest/relevance/value to their customers, so they likewise do not get to unilaterally determine that things like price information are not relevant to them.)
I am usually very mistake-theory. Smart, good-natured people can simply be mistaken about things. They could just not have been challenged ever or just not thought things through. At this point, though, when it's clear that all of your other excuses were total trash and you're resting on pure assumption of power to determine for yourself what has relevance to others, even when they're disagreeing, I start feeling left with few other options. I start feeling that either you managed to hide being surprisingly low IQ long enough to get a medical degree and you honestly struggle to understand... or you're basically just morally evil, on par with the communists, who took power upon themselves to decide what was of relevance/value to others to a similarly insane degree.
(Further Edit: It would be insane if this was your job. I really don't think you want to adopt a rule that actually makes it your job to truly understand every patient's situation/interests/values/relevance and have standards by which you are required to determine whether pricing information is relevant to them and their particular situation. It is much much easier for you to just tell them and let them think for themselves, and decide whether or not to consent to the costs/benefits. Would you really support a conceptual schema that said that auto mechanics didn't give you a price; they were instead required by some fiduciary duty to try to understand everything about you personal situation, financial and otherwise, what your interests are, what your values are, etc., and make some determination (probably according to some objective standards, probably subject to lawsuits if they're wrong in their assessment) as to whether or not they think certain pricing information is "relevant" to you?! You want to reduce administrative grief; you do not want that. Forget CoI issues; you don't want that on your own terms. It would be a nightmare compared to just giving people the price.)
Further Further Edit: To the extent that you think you are doing something like this as part of your job, I am telling you that your profession is failing. I can only tell you so many times that I have personally experienced times where having even EOB-type information at the time of decision could have mattered. You have failed. This failure is probably part of why there is so much outrage, so much clamoring for additional regulation and such.
What relevance?
It informs me as to the likely costs of various options, allowing me to proceed in deliberation and/or discussion about priorities and tradeoffs. This is straightforward stuff.
You cannot save money with this information. The higher number may be cheaper. Your insurance company cannot save money with this information (for you). I don't know how many times I can tell you this. This number doesn't mean what you think it means.
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